


Lineages

by coffeejunkii



Category: Halt and Catch Fire
Genre: Accidental parent Joe MacMillan, Casually bisexual Joe MacMillan, Coming Out, Found Family, Gen, Queer Themes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-14
Updated: 2018-08-14
Packaged: 2019-06-27 02:42:23
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,258
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15676389
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coffeejunkii/pseuds/coffeejunkii
Summary: “So, on the internet, you think you can be who you really are.”A string of conversations between Joe and Haley as they navigate life, love, and loss.





	Lineages

**Author's Note:**

> This story fills in gaps in canon throughout the latter half of season 4, starting with 4x06. Some lines of dialogue are taken straight from various episodes.
> 
> Many thanks to Rurounihime for betaing and to Pollyrepeat for sharing my love of Joe MacMillan.

“She seems cool.” Joe extends the assessment as an invitation, curious to see if Haley will take him up on it.

She doesn’t. Her gaze breaks away. “Er…what were we talking about again?”

“So, on the internet, you think you can be who you really are.” Joe is happy to go back to that thread of their conversation, related as it is. Being yourself, and the precious few places where that can happen.

“Right. So, yeah. I mean, no one’s judging what you like, or asks you why, or…yeah.”

Something twists right under Joe’s ribcage, a strange painful happiness. He tries to imagine what it would have been like to have the internet when he was fifteen. He can’t. But for Haley to have this place to go to, to connect to others who are also figuring this out—it means everything to him. “It’s a wonderful place, isn’t it?”

A bright smile breaks over Haley’s face. “The best. Well, aside from Comet.”

Joe returns the smile. “I’m glad. I—” He shakes his head. He’ll tell her, but not now. “I’m glad.”

+++

“That’s why you’re not a parent, and you never will be.”

Gordon’s words tear right through Joe’s heart. He tries to speak, tries to hurl back something, but he can’t. Those words were meant to hurt, but Gordon likely has no idea how much. How could he? Joe’s known nearly his whole life that parenthood was a precarious possibility, more likely than not denied to him because of how and who he’s loved. Even now, with Cam, it’s out of reach.

“You’re right,” he tells Gordon. It’s the truth, after all. 

Joe’s done with this conversation. He leaves Gordon’s office, waves off requests for assistance as he crosses the floor, and heads down to the basement.

His old work station is coated in dust. So are the old servers. Joe closes his eyes, but the sense of loss presses in nevertheless. An undercurrent of failure tries to weave in as well, but Joe pushes it away.

He won’t fail Haley. 

Fuck Gordon and his inability to see.

+++

From: jmm@cometlist.net  
To: haley@cometlist.net  
Subject: Milkshakes on Saturday?

Hi Haley,

Just wondering how you are. If you need a study break, we could get milkshakes on Saturday?

-jmm

 

From: haley@cometlist.net  
To: jmm@cometlist.net  
Subject: Re: Milkshakes on Saturday?

Yes! I want to drop off a mixtape for Vanessa anyway. Can you pick me up at 2?

Joe smiles at the screen until his cheeks hurt. A mixtape, god. He was never allowed to be this innocent.

+++

Vanessa loves the mixtape. Haley’s eyes shine as they talk, her hands a barometer of her feelings, always in motion.

A fierce protectiveness rises in Joe. He wants to preserve this moment for Haley forever—this sense of connection, of seeing yourself reflected back in another person. It has taken Joe far too long in his life to realize that this is what matters.

After more than a few milkshakes, Joe drives Haley home. 

Haley reaches for the door. “Thanks, that was great. I totally needed to get out of the house.” 

“You got a second?” Joe asks. “I want to tell you something.”

Haley lets go of the handle. “Sure. What’s up?” She looks at him, curious as always.

“Sophomore year of high school I nearly failed chemistry because I couldn’t stop looking at Jonathan.” Joe can still see his profile, etched into his memory. “He was so beautiful, and I got lost thinking about—well, thinking about him.” There’s a hint of a frown on Haley’s face. “That’s the first time I had a crush on a guy. It went nowhere, but I knew…I knew what this meant. What those feelings meant.” He studies Haley’s face, but he can’t read her expression. “The first time I kissed another man was in college. I don’t really remember that kiss, but I remember thinking, ‘Yes. This is who I am. This will always be part of who I am.’” 

Haley looks at him for a long moment. “Okay. Um. I’ve gotta go.” She pushes the door open and gets out.

Fuck. 

Joe jumps out of the car, but finds himself frozen on the spot without any idea of what else to say to Haley. He watches her head up the lawn toward the house.

Her steps slow to a stop. 

Joe rounds the car, uncertain if he should go to her. 

Haley turns around and walks back to him. “But what about Cam? I thought you loved her.”

Joe exhales silently. Okay. This, he can do. “I do love her.” He pauses. Saying that out loud still feels strange. “I like both women and men.”

“So you’ve dated guys before?”

Joe smiles. “Yes. A few.”

Haley twists her hoodie between her hands. “I…” She shifts from one foot to the other. “I like Vanessa a lot. Like, really like her.”

“I know,” Joe says softly.

Haley looks up at him. “I don’t know—I don’t—I—” Her hand flutters next to her in jerked arcs.

Joe reaches out to squeeze her shoulder and is unprepared when Haley crumples against him. He gently folds her into his arms. His heart is going a thousand miles a minute.

“It’s okay,” he mumbles. “I promise.” It’s what he wants her to take away from this: to know without a doubt that what she feels is okay. Yes, it’s confusing and new. But it’s not wrong, or something to be ashamed of. Never that. _Never_.

Haley clings to him for a minute before stepping away. She rubs the back of her hand over her eyes.

Joe smiles at her, hoping it looks less wobbly then he feels. He waits until she has composed herself. “You can always come and talk to me. Or email.” It sounds like such a goddamn cliché, but he means it. Hopefully, she knows that. 

She nods.

“And your parents—”

“Have no clue,” Haley supplies.

“Yeah.” Joe’s smile widens. “Straight people can be oblivious.”

That gets a laugh out of Haley. “God, I know.”

They share a look, and there’s recognition there, and understanding.

“I should go,” Haley says. “Mom’s probably hiding behind the curtains wondering what this is all about.”

Joe wouldn’t put that past Donna. “Just blame it all on me.”

Haley sobers for a moment. “Thanks. For…getting it.”

“Anytime.”

He watches until she’s safely inside before getting into his car.

+++

Things seem to look up: Gordon gets a clue about Haley, and Haley is set to return to Comet.

Then everything changes. Again.

+++

Joe mechanically folds shirts, sweaters, and pants into garbage bags. He doesn’t let himself think beyond the task: getting seams to line up, avoiding creases, arranging neat towers of similar-sized squares. 

Once he has completed his task, he carries the bags downstairs, gets into his car, drives to Goodwill. Keep going, don’t look back.

Haley’s resigned expression upon hearing that all the clothes are gone shakes Joe out of his stupor.

He’s going to fix this. 

+++

The Goodwill employee remains unmoved. “This is company policy, man, I don’t know what to say.” 

“Let’s go,” Haley says again.

Joe throws one last look at the guy, who doesn’t give a shit about their grief. Memories well up as he turns to follow Haley.

“It is what it is, man.”

It’s 1986 again in the blink of an eye, and Joe stands on the threshold of an apartment in the Castro, watching as people stuff the remainder of a life into bags. He’s not allowed inside—in the name of public health. Whose health, he wonders. Not his, or the man’s whose existence is slowly erased by whoever is clearing out his place.

But fuck if he’s going to let this happen again.

“You’ve got your learner’s permit, right?” he asks Haley.

+++

When Joe jumps into the car clutching the bag, he feels triumphant. Fuck Goodwill. Fuck policy. 

They start laughing, and for the first time in days, Joe can breathe.

“Holy shit,” Haley says.

It feels good to laugh with her, to let go for just a moment as they tear down the road.

Their laughter continues as they discover that it’s the wrong bag, but it’s more muted, and dies quickly.

Like so many rebellions in Joe’s life, this one fizzles out fast. The vise is back around his lungs. His hands twist into the colorful dresses spilling out from the bag, so similar to the ones his mother used to wear.

Getting the sweater back for Haley should have been an easy thing. Should have been unnecessary, if he’d only looked beyond his own thoughts. But he didn’t, and he can’t look at Haley for the rest of the day, too embarrassed to have failed her so utterly.

He apologizes to her during dinner. No one seems to think this apology is necessary, Haley included, but he needs her to know that he tried. That he cares.

+++

Joe works on the Comet commercial the entire summer. It has to be perfect.

+++

“I want everyone to leave me alone! I’ll be in the car.” Haley grabs the car keys from her mom’s purse and storms out.

Joe looks after her, numb, his mind and heart filling with static.

He’s glad that Cam decides not to stay the night.

The commercial was supposed to ease some of the hurt they still feel. Offer a new direction. Purpose.

He hoped that it would make Haley see the potential that still resides in Comet, that she’d remember why they started this project together, and how they could continue it in Gordon’s memory.

Now he isn’t even sure that she’ll speak to him again.

+++ 

At 2am, Joe emails her an apology. He still believes what he told Gordon: Haley needs to know that she’s not alone. That the people closest to her care, even if that means keeping their distance for now.

When Joe checks his email the next morning, there’s no reply. Not that he expected one, but it still stings.

+++

The phone rings mid-afternoon. Joe listens to Haley’s heartbreak unfolding in half-sentences and stifled sobs. When she falls silent, he asks, “Do you want me to come get you?”

After a pause, Haley says yes.

+++

“Could’ve told me you drove here.” Joe rounds Haley’s car to lean against the hood next to her.

She shrugs and tucks a strand of hair behind her ear.

Joe holds back the reassurances crowding in his mind. He isn’t sure what she wants or needs from him, and the last thing he wants is to upset this fragile truce.

“People suck,” Haley says. “I thought that Vanessa—” She stops. “I was so stupid! Why can’t I like her as a friend? I wish I wasn’t…” Her hand balls into a fist.

Joe turns toward her. “Don’t say that. I know it’s hard, being….not being like everyone else, but it can also be special and wonderful, especially if you connect with people who are like you.” He wills her to understand. That he’s not only talking about an abstract situation, but also about them. About their connection, and how he hopes it can be salvaged.

For a long while, Haley doesn’t say anything. “That’s why I called you. Because you’re the only one who’d understand.”

Joe’s throat threatens to close up. He draws in a deep breath. “I’m glad you did.”

+++

After things end with Cam, Joe is torn between buying an airplane ticket to anywhere the next day and not leaving at all. Leaving feels like breaking every promise he ever made to Haley.

He sees a fortune teller, who tells him nothing, but running into Dale Butler conjures images of maple trees stretching across hillsides in dots of orange and yellow and red, the crunch of leaves underfoot, the first sharp bite of frost. 

It’s strange to be back East at first, but it feels right.

Once he has settled into his new life, he writes a letter to Haley and hopes that putting pen to paper conveys the sincerity of his words. He ends with, “Don’t forget about me when you run all of Silicon Valley.” He firmly believes she’ll go farther than he ever did.

+++

There are more letters, emails, and the occasional phone call over the next three years, and then Joe stands in front of a dorm at MIT to help Haley move in. Even Donna seems happy to see him.

+++

“I met someone,” Haley says, a small hitch in her voice, during a phone call on a particularly bleak Tuesday the following February.

Joe smiles. “I met someone, too.” 

“Yeah?”

“His name is James. He has two kids. It’s…” Joe doesn’t know how to contain the swirl of emotions. 

“That’s weird. Or not! I mean. Is it?”

“It’s different. A good kind of different.” It’s also still very new, but Joe hopes that it will turn into something permanent.

“About time,” she teases, but he can hear her smile.

“Enough about my boring middle-aged life. Tell me more about—“

“Holly. And yes, I know, Haley and Holly, haha. But. Whatever. We met at Queer Alliance. She’s into _X-Files_ and coding and her dad works for NASA and she said we might be able to go to the Space Shuttle launch next month. Oh, and last week, we went to see _Boys on the Side_ , which is awesome by the way, and—”

He closes his eyes as he continues to listen, her joy echoing within himself.


End file.
